Gov. Healey speaks at a State House press conference on July 31 announcing her proposed “DRIVE Initiative” bill. The legislation would pump $400 million into the state’s biotech research economy to help make up for reversals in federal research funding policies. Photo by Ella Adams | State House News Service
Biotech is not for the faint of heart. Nowhere is that truer than in Massachusetts, the world’s leading life sciences hub.
In an industry where nine out of every 10 drug candidates never make it to market, risk comes with the territory. But when breakthroughs happen, they transform lives and remind us why this work matters.
Those lives, and the relentless drive we have in Massachusetts to improve them, still fuel my optimism. But optimism alone cannot overcome the challenges we face.
This year has brought a wave of uncertainty. From shifting tariff policies to leadership upheaval at the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health, the cautious optimism I noted in this newspaper last year has given way to volatility.
People are out of work. Companies are burning through shortened funding runways. Washington continues to throw curveballs.
That instability is showing up in the numbers.
Investor confidence has cooled, with virtually no IPOs in Massachusetts. M&A activity slowed, and venture capital funding down 17 percent year-over-year.
Making that last statistic even worse is that more than half of it was concentrated across just 10 deals, according to MassBio’s latest Industry Snapshot report. Early-stage biotech companies, the lifeblood of our ecosystem, are the ones feeling this squeeze the most.
These are no longer just caution lights; they are alarm bells. To maintain Massachusetts’ leadership in global drug development and keep breakthroughs coming, we cannot allow uncertainty to paralyze us.
We must take bold, strategic action now.
Congress Can Help
Industry will continue to do its part.
If there is one thing I have learned in nearly two decades at MassBio, it’s that this is not an industry to bet against. Even amid headwinds, we are seeing green shoots: Leasing activity is picking up, M&A ticked upward in July, a biotech (albeit a NY company) filed for an IPO in August after a long drought and new VC funds are coming online.
These point-in-time indicators suggest opportunity if we seize it.
But we cannot go it alone. We need government to be a true partner in driving momentum back into the system.
That starts with a coordinated federal strategy to strengthen every link in the innovation chain – a comprehensive competitiveness package. Congress must fully fund the National Institutes of Health, increase support for the new ARPA-H health research agency and reauthorize and expand the Small Business Innovation Research program that fuels early-stage discovery.
We need incentives for R&D, investments in domestic biomanufacturing, streamlined regulatory approvals and protections for pillars like the Bayh-Dole Act.
These are national priorities, especially as competitors like China are making aggressive investments and recruiting talent to capture leadership in next-generation modalities. The Snapshot shows China making major gains in the global drug pipeline and advanced technologies, while the U.S. and Massachusetts saw only modest growth.
Kendalle Burlin O’Connell
What Massachusetts Can Do
Massachusetts is uniquely positioned to capitalize on the right policies.
We lead the world in cell and gene therapy, RNA technologies and other advanced modalities. We have the brightest minds, the most daring entrepreneurs, purpose-built lab space and a state government that just renewed its commitment through a new 10-year Life Sciences Initiative.
Gov. Maura Healey’s proposed $400 million DRIVE initiative is exactly the kind of bold step we need to spur early-stage innovation and workforce development, and it deserves support from every corner of the ecosystem.
Our strength has never been just one company or one breakthrough. It’s the flywheel of talent, investors, science, infrastructure and public-private partnerships that keeps innovation turning.
Yes, the wheel has slowed. But we hold the keys to get it spinning again.
When we do, we’ll put talented employees back to work, bring investors off the sidelines, fill our lab towers and fund the science that improves and saves lives.
I still believe Massachusetts is built to deliver just that.
Kendalle Burlin O’Connell is president and CEO of the statewide life sciences trade group MassBio.
